SIS apologises to former Green MP for past treatment as a ‘threat’
In 2009, Keith Locke discovered he had been spied on for more than fifty years, even while serving as an MP.In a letter sent to Mr Locke last year, SIS head Rebecca Kitteridge said the former MP had been described as a “threat” in speaking notes for an induction programme run by the agency since 2013.
The SIS were spying on Keith Locke since he was a child and he was listed as a threat up until 2013 because he spoke out about the power of the SIS.
The document suggested he was seen as a threat because he was a vocal critic of the service.
“People who criticise the agencies publicly are exercising their right to freedom of expression and protest, which are rights that we uphold, and are enshrined in the Intelligence and Security Act 2017,” Ms Kitteridge said.
Mr Locke said the recent report into the use of external security consultants to spy on citizens spurred him to make the apology public.
“It’s important to put a stop to this sort of thing and hopefully the apology from Rebecca Kitteridge led to putting a stop to that sort of labeling and potentially that sort of monitoring or surveillance,” Mr Locke said.
Since when could a man of peace like Keith Locke be considered a threat and continue to be classified as a threat because he speaks out against the unchecked power of the Secret Intelligence Service?
In the months leading up to the 2011 election, the SIS colluded with John Key’s Office to attack Phil Goff with false allegations about Goff having knowledge of Israeli spies. That the SIS were willing to interfere in our internal elections to smear the Leader of the Opposition has never been given the coverage it deserves and yet here they are claiming Keith Locke is a threat to national security.
After the mass surveillance revelations, the abuse of surveillance powers by the NZ Police against Nicky Hager and myself, the revelations that state agencies spied on activists, Iwi, political parties, earthquake survivors and sexual assault survivors and the latest news that MBIE created false social media accounts to spy on New Zealanders, our media should be demanding accountability and explain to voters the obscenity of State surveillance.
Instead we get hourly updates of fucking British tourists being rude.
Who is the real threat here? Keith Locke or the SIS?
Like any large organization the SIS has good days and bad days. Seeing as China and America want to sit us down all the time for cyber breaches, I’d say SIS is incompetent. But are they under reconstruction? Or are they making up excuses? Or are they getting on with the job of making improvements? Hard to tell.
We’ll probably never know when SIS is having a good day. All though there’s those small matters of foreign political donations. Vote rigging, and in general sub par elections held around the pacific. So when the SIS is having a good day, democracy in general is having a good day.
The SIS and GCSB are effectively agents for power structures outside of NZ.
john key is transparently directed within the arrangement, as we have seen in the results of his back room deals.
If gentleman Keith Locke was a regarded a ‘threat’ for the SIS then who wasn’t?
This is what makes the SIS a laughing stock.
And raises the serious question do NZers need protection from the SIS?
However good their past mistakes are exposed and they have fronted up and it is now out in the open.
But Keith is the son of Elsie Locke so of course they were spying on him as a child. My mother was also part of the Communist group into the late 50’s so I remember clicks on the line growing up. In the early eighties there was a directive about Communists not being followed and spied on. So from that point it was legally questionable.
Time to disband both the SIS and GCSB. we’ve had two acts of modern day terrorism, the Trades Hall bombing, and the Rainbow Warrior bombing. Neither were prevented by our so-called “intelligence agencies”. Their ONE JOB was to uncover such plots and they fucked it up. Funding them hundreds of millions of dollars is a gross waste of our tax dollars.
The SIS has little credibility, tho’ I suppose we only know the negative instances. I would account Keith Locke a democratic, and thus, a NZ hero. So, something wrong with the SIS. Let alone them trying to recruit my cousin to spy on my uncle because he pissed off our one horse town ruler Muldoon.
Both SIS and GCSB are post Cold War relics. As MJOLNIR says time to disband them and retire their entire personnel.
The reason you don’t rebuild with old staff from the former agencies is that the culture comes with the people, and it needs refreshing.
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